Celeb Secrets has teamed up with Taki to spotlight some of the Internet’s top creators each month, where they share their journey on how they rose to Internet fame and interact with fans on the new interactive platform.
When social media personality YaGirlAri was a kid, she always had dreams of becoming a famous YouTuber. About two years ago, Ari downloaded TikTok for fun and documented her time in college by sharing videos of herself and her friends, not knowing that she would gain over 300K followers on the platform to date.
“Once I saw that my following was actually a thing and I did have a platform, my ultimate goal was to be someone that younger kids could look up to as a member of the LGBT community, especially as a Hispanic lesbian,” she tells Celeb Secrets. “I wanted to be someone that kids could look up to, or just like people my age. I wanted to be a good example.”
The new interactive platform Taki, where you can request actors, content creators, gamers, and athletes to deliver a custom video message to friends, family members, or even yourself, saw how wildly popular Ari’s videos were and brought her on board to share custom videos to some of her biggest supporters.
“When I first joined [TikTok], I noticed that when I was going live, my comments would be consistent to where I couldn’t read them as they came and I kept missing some. [Taki] gives me the chance to respond to all those comments that I missed, like, ‘hey can you say happy birthday to my friend?’ I really try to get to every comment but it gets difficult sometimes,” she says.
Receiving a mix of everything from greeting and birthday messages to life and relationship advice, Ari says her favorite type of Taki videos to film are ones where she could share her input on a fan’s situation, hoping that it helps them in the long run with whatever they are going through during that time.
“I don’t have like a specific one, but I do have a favorite type of message to get, because it was part of my goal,” Ari tells Celeb Secrets. “Sometimes I’ll get people asking for advice, which I think is best to ask for on Taki, because you can be more personal. You can send me a long explanation of what you need advice on. If you ask for that kind of stuff when I’m live, where I usually get asked that stuff, it’s just harder for me to really dive deep into your question. I’m pretty sure [Taki messages] can be as long as it needs to be — they are usually around a minute. I’ll say, ‘Hey, this is your problem, this is how I personally — I’m not a therapist — but this is how I personally would deal with it.’ And it’s more of like a personal thing. I can get more into depth and detail.”
Being that today is National Coming Out Day and Ari is an open member of the LGBTQ community with a large platform, we asked the social media personality about her coming out experience and the best advice she could give people who may be struggling with coming out to their loved ones.
“One of the biggest things I’ve recently learned is that sexuality is very fluid. If you have an accepting family or friends and you come out as one thing, that does not mean that you’re stuck. I was stuck for a while. Growing up, I had boyfriends in high school and then when I went to college, I was like, ‘this is what’s been wrong the whole time, I’m actually gay, like I’m actually lesbian. I like girls,'” she says.
“I was really scared to come out for a while because it’s just like, I come out as gay and then if I changed my mind, I thought, ‘oh my gosh, people are gonna think I’m weird.’ And there’s so many different terms, there’s so many different labels. I think you shouldn’t be nervous because you’re not a hundred percent sure. I think it definitely helps to say it out loud to somebody. But as far as coming out, the same advice I always give is be who you are one hundred percent. Don’t try to hide it unless it’ll put you in a very unsafe situation. If your family is not accepting and you know it — they’ve vocally said it and you’ve you feel trapped – don’t put yourself in a dangerous situation and I mean that in like the nicest way possible. I don’t know if I knew that my parents were homophobic — they’re not, but if they were — I definitely understand being nervous to come out, however, you don’t owe that to anybody as long as you’re true to yourself. And if you personally can like experience it and really figure out who you are, then that’s what matters. And if you’re out, then you don’t owe anyone an explanation.”
Aside from making TikToks and Taki videos, Ari has been busy during quarantine by working on launching a joint YouTube channel with her girlfriend, where they will post couples vlogs while documenting their upcoming move in January.
“My girlfriend’s going to kill me,” Ari says when exclusively telling CS about the new project. “We haven’t told anybody about it [yet].”
You can follow Ari on Instagram at @ariikrystizzle and have her make a customized video message for you and your friends by visiting her Taki page here.
With reporting by Caroline Renezeder
